Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus! Happy St David’s Day - and happy Friday. It’s the end of another busy week here in Digital, with lots of big pieces of work underway.

Marine discovery project

The marine licensing project is in full swing now, with research and content design work getting underway alongside the folks from Deloitte.

We’ve held seven user interviews this week to learn more about our marine licensing process. We’ve spoken to different types of applicants and also consultees who respond to applications to raise any concerns about them.

So far we’re hearing familiar themes from our research in other areas of NRW:

  • Users find it hard to check online whether they need a licence and if so, which type
  • Legislation and NRW guidance is open to interpretation
  • Users feel NRW takes a one-size-fits-all approach
  • Users feel that a two-way conversation with NRW before applying for a licence would save weeks of emails for both the applicant and NRW
  • Users talked about being frustrated by being directed to the legislation instead of NRW clearly explaining how legislation related to their application.

We look forward to learning more in next week’s interviews!

The insights we’re gaining will be hugely helpful to Sam and Toyah, who have been mapping out the various current application processes, ready to start designing versions that will feel more user-friendly to applicants.

Sitting in on the ‘deep dive’ activities held with the different NRW areas involved in the overall licensing service (permit receipt centre, finance, marine licensing and co) has also been really valuable for this and given us some food for thought.

Presenting our work on permissions

Fresh into the new week, Laura, Sam and Lucinda presented the permissions (to use NRW managed land) report and roadmap to leadership.

They covered what they did, learned and how they put that learning into practice. They made recommendations around how:

  • digital team resources for ongoing work on this service aligns with our other NRW priorities
  • NRW can continue the work done with GOV.UK Pay and GOV.UK Notify the internal service could both be made more streamlined but also reframed so that NRW has a more flexible approach to users
  • tools we already use – like Citizen Space – might help the team manage the work
  • digital can support the permissions team with the change to user-centred approaches

The permissions team have been giving feedback about how users are using the new service. We’ve given them a shared spreadsheet to use, which is really useful.

It’s clear that there is still a mismatch between the information NRW expects all users to provide in their application and what we know the user is able to provide.

The new application process allows for some flexibility. But this goes against the usual thinking of ‘one way for all applicants’ regardless of type of activity, scale of activity and the nature of the organisation applying.

This is a difficult area - not just for permissions - and will need more work and thought.

Cockle form feedback

We’ve received some lovely feedback from a staff member about the updated cockle licence application form and guidance we worked on recently:

“The form has worked brilliantly, I have had no issues from the users, and it has captured all the information I have needed, and for me to work with it and review the information has been really easy. I have a handful of paper applications, but the vast majority have used the online form and no issues as yet… fingers crossed!!”

Feedback like this really makes us smile - it’s great to know that our work is meeting staff needs as well as user needs.

Accessibility auditing our way through the backlog…

This week, Owain, Kim and Sophie met to set about auditing all the remaining evidence reports in our backlog. Due to an influx in web requests, and our team being short staffed, we’ve had to prioritise other tasks, but now we are getting stuck into the backlog of less time sensitive tasks.

A day in the life of a Digital Wooficer…

On Tuesday 20 February, it was National Love Your Pet Day, so we celebrated with a catch up with some of our Digital Wooficers. Today we speak with Wooficer Monty and Wooficer Rolo who share their top tips for supporting their team.

monty the dachshund sits with his pup cup

Monty says: “Being an emotional support dog is not a walk in the park (if you’ll pardon the pun). Sometimes my hooman gets stressed when she’s sent too many emails, so I like to suggest we get outside for a walk, to stretch our legs and source a much needed pup cup for me, after a long morning of meetings. My hooman loves to get out with me as a way to break up a busy day.”

Rolo the black pug on a Digital team call

Rolo says: “Snacks make the world go round, I’m sure that’s a famous quote. My hooman needs a biscuit to keep her energy levels up throughout the day, and I like to keep the office clean by hoovering up the crumbs that she sometimes drops.”

Fun fact

Did you ever wonder why the leek is a symbol of Wales? Legend has it that St David suggested Welsh soldiers wear one on their helmets to distinguish them from the invading Saxon soldiers who wore similar uniforms. The leek still features in the uniforms of Welsh regiments to this day!